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The United Nations has condemned a suicide bombing on Sunday at a Damascus church that killed at least 25 worshippers, including women and children during mass, as a “heinous crime”.

More than 60 churchgoers were also wounded in the attack, which is reported to be the first in the Syrian capital since rebel groups ousted former president Bashar al-Assad in December, ending more than a decade of civil war.

The UN Secretary-General António Guterres told an emergency meeting of the Security Council on Sunday that massive overnight strikes by the United States on Iran’s nuclear facilities only increase the risk of a wider war and “serious damage to the intern

The top UN humanitarian official in the Occupied Palestinian Territory has issued a stark warning over the deepening crisis in Gaza, where civilians are being killed daily while trying to access food, water and medical care.

Speaking to journalists in Deir al Balah on Saturday, Jonathan Whittall, who heads the UN humanitarian coordination office (OCHA) in Gaza and the West Bank, said: “The attempt to survive is being met with a death sentence.”

UN Secretary-General António Guterres said on Wednesday he remains “profoundly alarmed” by the ongoing military escalation between Israel and Iran, as the sides continued to trade airstrikes.  

Secretary-General António Guterres condemned Israeli strikes in Iran late Thursday evening, urging ‘maximum restraint’ from Member States. The head of the UN-backed atomic watchdog also highlighted the risk of a wider conflict.  

Hate speech is a warning sign and a driver of violence, UN Secretary-General António Guterres said ahead of Wednesday’s International Day for Countering Hate Speech.

“It is an alarm bell: the louder it rings, the greater the threat of genocide,” he warned.

A senior UN official has warned against the impact of regional escalation on Syria as the country continues on the path to political transition following the overthrow of the Assad regime last December and nearly 14 years of devastating civil war. 

“Syria simply cannot withstand another wave of instability,” UN Deputy Special Envoy Najat Rochdi said on Tuesday in a briefing to the Security Council in New York. 

Ships in the port of Nice sounded their fog-horns on Friday, a brassy crescendo to a rare moment of global unity as the Third UN Ocean Conference drew to a close. Moments earlier, more than 170 countries had adopted by consensus a sweeping political declaration promising urgent action to protect the ocean.

“We close this historic week not just with hope, but with concrete commitment, clear direction, and undeniable momentum,” Li Junhua, the UN’s Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs and Secretary-General of the summit, told reporters.

Tens of thousands of people went missing in Syria over the past 50 years including during 14 years of civil war. Now, some families are able to live in hope as the Middle Eastern country emerges from the traumatic period of dictatorship and conflict.

People in the Gaza Strip are getting hungrier because of the “very limited” volume of food being allowed in, UN aid agencies reiterated on Wednesday.  

Only around 6,000 tonnes of wheat flour have entered the war-torn enclave since Israel began to allow limited supplies back in last month.